Sleepwear brand Peter Alexander has reported a significant boost to its visual merchandising strategy in-store after signing on with Simon Molnar’s growing start-up venture Flagship.
Simon Molnar is the brother of Nick Molnar, billionaire founder of ‘buy now pay later’ platform Afterpay.
Peter Alexander VM brand manager Rebecca Withers said much of the improvement involves freed-up time for in-store teams.
"Previously, it took, on average, five hours per month for each store to individually attribute products to each fixture and correlate individual sales reports,” Withers said.
“With Flagship, sales performance is now automatically processed in real time, eliminating the time spent to manually money-map each store. That’s over 590 hours per month of the store team’s time saved."
This win comes after Flagship recorded 357 per cent growth in the last 12 months and has expanded its team to 12 employees across Australia and the United States, with plans to grow headcount by 35 per cent by year-end.
The start-up also led a US seed funding round, led by venture capital firms Coreline and Veridical Ventures, together with Tidal Ventures, and Macdoch Ventures, raising US$3.75 million (~A$5.95 million).
As well as Peter Alexander, Flagship has also partnered with the likes of bootmaker R.M. Williams and shoe brand Jo Mercer, as well as US brands Vuori and Mejuri.
Jo Mercer reported a 50 per cent faster VM guide creation since signing on, moving from over eight hours of planning and guide creation, to as little as four hours.
There has also been a 20 per cent increase in in-store team efficiency through the elimination of manual processes and automating feedback loops.
Jo Mercer operates 28 stores across Australia.
“We’re incredibly excited to be partnered with amazing brands like Peter Alexander, R.M.Williams and Accent Group’s Stylerunner in Australia as well as Vuori, Mejuri and Madhappy in the US,” Molnar said.
“These flagship partnerships underscore the growing demand for our platform in the U.S. market and validates our ability to deliver measurable results for high-growth retail brands globally.
"Visual merchandising has historically relied on manual processes and instinct. Our platform brings data-driven decision making to store optimisation, allowing retailers to maximise revenue while maintaining the creative elements that define physical retail."